The Spring Formal
by scottsman
Summary: Its spring formal time at PCA. Chase secretly buys an expensive designer gown for Zoey to wear only to have someone else take credit for the gift. will the truth come out will there be justice for the brokenhearted Chase read and find out.


It was spring formal time at PCA. Zoey, Chase and the rest of the gang had gotten the Girls Dean to drive them into to town. When they got to town the girls went to look for dresses and the guys made a bee line for the video game palace.

A little while later Chase was on his way to get a bite to eat when he passed Zoey, Lola and Quinn who were standing outside of the Farron house, a designer dress shop, they were looking at a bright red designer gown in the window.

"If only I had that for the formal," Zoey sighed

"I wouldn't count on that," said Quinn, "did you see the price tag,"

"Yeah," said Lola, "Five thousand dollars!"

Chase, who had paused at the sound of their voices, stifled a sigh he really didn't have much to look forward to at this dance. He didn't have a date and Zoey was already going with Alex Beckman the guy she had been dating.

Zoey looked longingly at the dress one more time then she and the girls headed off down to the street to a store they could actually afford.

Chase stood there watching them for a moment. Then he reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone and punched up his bank account on the screen. He had been saving his paychecks for months and he now had $5500.00 in his account. It was just a little more than enough to buy that knew Redline Electric 12 string guitar that he had his eye on for a while. This guitar was top of the line and Chase had been really excited to get it.

Pausing his thoughts about the guitar, he looked up at the dress in the window and thought about Zoey's longing look.

"Oh well," he said to himself, as he walked toward the door of the Farron house, "I can always settle for a cheaper guitar."

###########################################

A couple of hours before the formal, when Chase knew all three girls would be out, he slipped into Zoey's room and left the dress box and the card he had picked out and signed on her bed. He was able to get in because Quinn had been using her room key in one of her experiments and had accidently vaporized it. And since she had a slightly different schedule than Lola or Zoey they had been leaving a key under the rug when ever both of them were out at the same time. At least until Quinn got her new room key.

Once Chase had completed his clandestine errand, he slipped back out again replacing the key under the rug. As far as he knew no one had seen him. But he was wrong. Alex, who had been looking for Zoey, saw Chase slip out of the room, return the key to its hiding place then head in the other direction toward the back door.

As soon as Chase was gone, Alex grabbed the key and let himself into the room. The suspicious look on his face darkened into a jealous scowl when he opened the box and saw the dress. Then he opened the card. It read.

_Zoey, hope you like the dress, and I hope you have a good time at the dance._

_Love Chase._

Buy the time that Alex had finished reading the card, he had an idea formulating in his head. Sticking the card in his pocket, he quickly scribbled another note to Zoey and left it with the box then he slipped out of the room. When he reached the trash cans out back, he took out the card crumpled it up and stuffed it down in one of the trashcans.

Then with a satisfied smile he turned and walked away .

Chase was just emerging from his dorm all clad in his tuxedo, when he met Zoey and Alex who were passing by on their way to the gym where the dance was being held. Chase smiled when he saw Zoey all decked out in the red Gown.

"Hi Zoey," he said, "You look beautiful!"

"Thanks," said Zoey Happily, "This dress is incredible I can't believe that Alex bought it for me!" Chase felt like someone had kicked him in the stomach. One looked at the subtle smirk appeared briefly on Alex's face and Chase knew the whole story.

It took all the strength Chase had to not react.

"I hope you have a good time, Zoey," he said quietly. Zoey, completely oblivious to everything grabbed Alex by the arm and off they went.

As soon as they were out of sight, Chase visibly deflated undoing the bow tie of his tuxedo. He certainly didn't feel like going to the dance now. He just wanted to be alone. Walking down through the woods he emerged onto the beach. After walking up the beach a ways he sat down on a log and buried his head in his hands.

He wasn't sure how long he sat there like that, when he suddenly heard running footsteps behind him. Straightening up he turned just in time to see a person handspring into a double back flip and sail straight over his head. The mysterious gymnast landed the jump with the grace of a cat. He could see in the moonlight that his mysterious visitor was a girl who had blonde hair.

"I only know one person who announces herself like that," said Chase, "But she's in Santa Barbara isn't she?"

The impromptu acrobat reached up and pulled something out her hair. It fell down all around her shoulders and almost to her waist.

Chase began to smile for the first time in a while.

"I'd know that long head of hair anywhere!" he said jumping to his feet.

"Cassandra Jane Watson, in the flesh," said a smiling feminine voice." Cassandra Jane Watson called Cassie or C.J. by her friends was the Goddaughter of Chase's father so she and Chase, who were the same age, had practically grown up together. She was as agile as a cat and had several gymnastics titles to her credit. C.J. was a very beautiful girl to be sure, but her most famous feature was her near waist length silky- straight blonde hair. When she was doing gymnastics she kept it up in a tight bun though. She liked her hair the way it was and refused to have it cut any shorter no matter how much her gym coach fussed. She had gotten to where she could twist her hair up into a bun about as fast as the shorter haired girls on the team could put theirs in a ponytail, so her coach didn't fuss that much anymore.

"What are you doing here?" asked Chase pulling her into a hug.

"I'm here for my cousin's birthday party," replied C.J. "Thought I'd stop by and see you."

"I'm glad you did," said Chase.

"Which brings me to my next question," said C.J., "Why, with a perfectly good dance going on, are you down here moping."

Chase sank down onto the log again.

"It's kind of a long story," he replied

"If you want to talk about it, I'll listen." She said sitting down next to him. Chase took a deep breath and proceeded to spill the beans.

When he finished C.J. leaned over and gave him a long gentle hug.

"I'm so sorry, Chase," she said, "You didn't deserve that."

"You know," said Chase, "I have liked Zoey ever since she came to PCA, but it seems like every time I get up the nerve to try and make her notice me or to express my feelings something or someone gets in the way. It's like fate is against me. Maybe it's just not meant to be."

The two old friends sat there in companionable silence for several seconds before either spoke.

"Chase," she finally said, "For whatever the opinion of an old friend is worth, any girl who can't see what a great guy you are, isn't good enough for you." Chase smiled as he felt blood rushing to his face. C.J,'s eyes lit up as she thought of something.

"Come on," she said Jumping up and grabbing his hand.

"What's up," said Chase as she pulled him to his feet.

"You remember that birthday party for my cousin?" said C.J.

Chase nodded.

"Well that cousin I was telling you about is Sara Michelson."

"The pop star?!" Chase gasped. C.J. nodded

"Her party is going to be a concert and pool party in one from her house in the Hollywood hills, it's going to be televised and she said I could bring anyone that I want. I just decided who I'm going to bring."

"Me!" said Chase

"Yeah," said C.J., "I'm not going to let one of my favorite fellows waste a beautiful evening like this feeling sorry for himself! So go get your swimming trunks you're going to need them."

Almost before Chase knew, it he found himself climbing into a luxurious white stretch limo with C.J. it was the first time he could ever remember wearing swimming trunks to a concert.

###################################

The spring formal was going along perfectly. Zoey was walking on air certain that she had the best boyfriend ever. Not only had he bought her that beautiful dress but just a few minutes ago he had asked her to wear his varsity pin. She had accepted enthusiastically. Lola was standing over by the refreshments waiting for her date to get back from the men's room. Michael was getting his date a snack and Logan was on the dance floor stepping on his date's toe for the second time since the song started.

Quinn had disappeared out the door to check on some experiment she had going on outside. Some things never changed. As she was on her way back, the garbage truck rolled by. A gust of went picked up a half crumpled envelope and blew it off the passing truck into Quinn's shoulder. She picked it up and was about to throw it into a nearby trashcan when she recognized Chase's handwriting. Straightening it out as best she could she pulled out the card and read it. Her eyes widened when she way what was written on the card. Turning around she took off for the dance.

Meanwhile at the Dance….

Dean Rivers had come up to the microphone with an announcement as a huge movie screen lowered into place behind him.

"Folks," he said, "We've a treat for you tonight, as you no doubt know, the pop star Sara Michelson is having her birthday party and concert tonight and it's a televised event, so were going broadcast it here tonight, as part of the entertainment for the dance."

He stepped down from the microphone as the screen flickered to life. The auditorium was soon filled with the music from the Concert at Sara Michelson's party. Zoey and her friends all stopped short when the Camera switched to a close up of the stage. There on the stage next to Sara Michelson was Chase Mathews!

Chase. Clad in a t-shirt and his swimming trunks, was playing a lively riff on the guitar as bikini Sara and C.J. danced around him.

"WHAT?!" thundered Logan loud enough for the whole room to hear him. The song ended and Chase put down the guitar and he and the girls left the stage.

"Okay," said the Emcee, "up next at this birthday bash we've got Mach 5, Triad, and many more. But first while the next band is setting up let's some get some fan reactions. The cameras began to move through the crowd.

They camera's came upon C.J. and Chase were on lounge chairs propped up on their elbows talking to each other and facing away from the cameras. their conversation stopped the camera man dead in his tracks

"Chase," said C.J. "How do you think that Weasel managed to trick this Zoey into believing that he gave her the dress, you said you left a card?"

"Well," said Chase, "The way I figure it, Alex must have seen me dropping off the dress in Zoey's room, he had to have gone in right after I left when He saw the dress and the card, All he would have had to do was get rid of the card and Zoey would have had no way of knowing who gave her the dress. So it would have been easy for him to lie and say he bought it for her."

"Didn't it occur to her to asked that guy how he just happened to know her exact dress size. Come to think of it; how did you know her dress size?!"

"A while back, before Alex showed up, they did a play I wrote there at the school, I found out her dress size while they were getting the costumes made. But Alex may know it too although I wouldn't know how."

" I still don't understand why you let him get away with it, you spent your guitar money on that dress and you didn't even get credit for the sweet thing you did," said C.J., "I'd have decked the creep."

"Oh sure," said Chase, "I deck her boyfriend and she'd never speak to me again!"

"You're a better man than I am Gunga din," said C.J., "I still think that you deserved that new guitar way more than that brain-dead Barbie doll deserved that dress!"

The rest of the conversation was lost as the emcee desperately signaled the cameraman to move on.

There was dead silence in the room. All eyes were on Zoey and Alex. Quinn had shown up and while all eyes were glued on the screen she had showed the card to Lola.

Zoey now turned on Alex with blood in her eyes.

"Alex," she growled, fury in her voice, "Is this true?!" Before Alex could think of a way to wiggle off the hook, Lola and Quinn came running up."

"It's all true," said Lola, she handed Zoey the card, "Quinn found this on the way back here."

Zoey took the card and read it. Then without warning, she whirled and hit Alex with a hard right cross that left him on the ground with a split lip. She jerked off his pin and threw it at him.

"There's your pin and I hope you sit on it!" she snapped before spinning on her heel and stalking out of the room still furious.

The next Day…

Chase came into his room it had been a long day or at least it seemed like it. Professor Rogers the history professor had to be the dullest teacher in the school. You start out his class taking notes and end it using your pencil as a jack to keep your eyes open. C.J. was lucky even she did have to leave on a midnight flight to some gymnastics meet at least on a midnight flight you're allowed to fall asleep without getting into trouble.

Chase dropped his books unceremoniously on his desk. When he turned to face his bed he stopped short. There was a long silver electric guitar case on his bed. Walking over to it he opened the case and to his astonishment found a brand new Redline 12 string electric guitar inside the very one he wanted.

He picked it up and saw a note on pink paper underneath it. he picked it up and read:

_Chase,_

_ Your friend was right you deserved this guitar way more than I deserved that dress._

_I hope you can forgive me._

_Signed,_

_The brain-dead Barbie doll_

"Zoey," said Chase to himself as the looked at the Guitar, "How did she get this?"

"I took the dress back," said a voice behind him. He turned and found Zoey standing there. He also caught sight of Lola and Quinn peaking around the doorframe.

Chase was about to say something when he spotted an ace bandage around Zoey's right wrist.

"What happened to your wrist?"

"She sprained it decking Alex," Lola blurted out before Zoey could open her mouth.

Chase's eyes widened as Zoey blushed.

"Maybe I should start calling you slugger," said Chase with a laugh, "That guy was almost a foot taller than you!"

The he looked at the guitar in his hands again.

"I really don't know what to say or how to thank you," he said

"I do," said Zoey, "You can play me a song."

Chase smiled.

**The End**

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